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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 1,081 records · Page 60
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1992

Rescheduling with iterative repair

This paper presents a new approach to rescheduling called constraint-based iterative repair. This approach gives our system the ability to satisfy domain constraints, address optimization concerns, minimize perturbation to the original schedule, and produce modified schedules quickly. The system begins with an initial, flawed schedule and then iteratively repairs constraint violations until a conflict-free schedule is produced. In an empirical demonstration, we vary the importance of minimizing perturbation and report how fast the system is able to resolve conflicts in a given time bound. These experiments were performed within the domain of Space Shuttle ground processing.

Zweben, Monte↗
NASA NTRS1993

Hybrid state-space self-tuning control of uncertain linear systems

The paper presents a hybrid state-space self-tuner using a new dual-rate sampling scheme for digital adaptive control of continuous-time uncertain linear systems. A state-space-based recursive least-squares algorithm, together with a variable forgetting factor, is used for direct estimations of both the equivalent discrete-time uncertain linear system parameters and the associated discrete-time state of a continuous-time uncertain linear system from the sampled input and output data. An analogue optimal regional pole-placement design method is used for designing an optimal observer-based analogue controller. A suboptimal observer-based digital controller is then designed from the designed analogue controller using digital redesign technique. To enhance the robustness of parameter identification and state estimation algorithms, a dynamic bound for a class of uncertain bilinear parameters and a fast-rate digital controller are developed at each fast-sampling period. Also, to accommodate computation loads and computation delay for developing the advanced hybrid self-tuner, the designed analogue controller and observer gains are both updated at each slow-sampling period. This control technique has been successfully applied to benchmark control problems.

Shieh, L. S.↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Thermal Protection Materials and Systems at NASA Ames Research Center

Thermal Protection Systems (TPS) are critical for enabling NASA missions involving high-speed atmospheric flight where the entries usually include descending into the atmosphere followed by a trajectory that aims to burn off energy and result in a controlled landing. NASA Ames focuses on qualifying and certifying TPS for current missions, sustaining TPS for future missions, and developing new TPS for upcoming missions where a heritage solution is not viable. More recently there is also a focus on advancing and transferring technologies that can benefit both commercial and government space needs. Developing mature thermal protection systems is a lengthy process involving advanced tools, extensive research, and testing. Design and analysis tools are used to predict aerothermal environments, aid the design of test and flight hardware, and support the testing for the thermal/mechanical response of thermal protection systems. More recently, advances in computational methods help reduce the time and cost of technological advances, aid in optimized material architecture design, and improve material properties and performance. While high-enthalpy testing that simulates the conditions of space flight remains essential for the evaluation and development of TPS materials, computational tools are already showing promise in reducing the need for widespread testing and can help fast-track the design cycle. With the exploration of new destinations EDL instrumentation remains an important element of the heatshield and NASA Ames and partners have developed and delivered instrumentation flight hardware in support of recent Mars missions (MSL and M2020) as well as Artemis Orion. Sensors installed on the heatshield and backshell of spacecraft provide coveted information about the aerodynamic and aerothermal environment during entry. Over the years NASA Ames has brought several reusable and ablative TPS materials to a level of readiness to hand off to missions and the branch continues to serve as a TPS steward for the agency. This presentation will cover current developments in the above areas that have enabled recent missions, and look to future TPS needs for missions such as Ice Giants.

thermal protection materials↗
NASA NTRSDate not supplied

Thermal Protection Materials and Systems at NASA Ames Research Center

Thermal Protection Systems (TPS) are critical for enabling NASA missions involving high-speed atmospheric flight where the entries usually include descending into the atmosphere followed by a trajectory that aims to burn off energy and result in a controlled landing. NASA Ames focuses on qualifying and certifying TPS for current missions, sustaining TPS for future missions, and developing new TPS for upcoming missions where a heritage solution is not viable. More recently there is also a focus on advancing and transferring technologies that can benefit both commercial and government space needs.Developing mature thermal protection systems is a lengthy process involving advanced tools, extensive research, and testing. Design and analysis tools are used to predict aerothermal environments, aid the design of test and flight hardware, and support the testing for the thermal/mechanical response of thermal protection systems. More recently, advances in computational methods help reduce the time and cost of technological advances, aid in optimized material architecture design, and improve material properties and performance. While high-enthalpy testing that simulates the conditions of space flight remains essential for the evaluation and development of TPS materials, computational tools are already showing promise in reducing the need for widespread testing and can help fast-trackthe design cycle.With the exploration of new destinations EDL instrumentation remains an important element of the heatshield and NASA Ames and partners have developed and delivered instrumentation flight hardware in support of recent Mars missions,including Mars Science Lab (MSL) and Mars 2020 (M2020),as well as Artemis Orion. Sensors installed on the heatshield and backshell of spacecraft provide coveted information about the aerodynamic and aerothermal environment during entry.Overthe years NASA Ames has brought several reusable and ablative TPS materials to a level of readiness to hand off to missions and the Thermal Protection Materials branch continues to serve as a TPS steward for the agency.

Thermal protection materials↗
DOE OSTI2026

Phase Transformation Enables Stable Cycling and Fast Charging of Cation-Disordered Rocksalt Cathodes

Developing high-capacity, long-life cathodes is critical to overcome the energy limitations of current Li-ion batteries. In this work, we report a Li-excess cation-disordered rocksalt (DRX) cathode, Li 1.167 Mn0.7Ti 0.133 O 1.8 F 0.2 (M 0.7 F 0.2 ), which demonstrates excellent electrochemical performance. This cathode delivers a capacity approaching 250 mAh g –1 and maintains 200 mAh g –1 over 200 cycles with an average discharge voltage of 3.1 V at 2 V cutoff. The formation of a spinel-like phase during cycling enables fast charging, achieving over 240 mAh g –1 at 2C for 100 cycles. Combined X-ray absorption spectroscopy and transmission electron microscopy reveal reversible electrochemical redox processes and stable Mn local structures during 2 V discharge. These results highlight the potential of DRX cathodes for next-generation Li-ion batteries and provide insights into strategies to overcome kinetic limitations and optimize the cathode-electrolyte interface.

25 ENERGY STORAGE↗
DOE OSTI2024

A first look at AS-ROC: a Si-Ge integrated chip readout for fast timing

Abstract Advances in timing detector technology require new specialized readout electronics. Applications demand below 10 ps time of arrival resolution and low power for a low repetition rate. A possible path to achieve O(10 ps) time resolution is an integrated chip using Silicon Germanium (SiGe) technology. Using DoE SBIR funding, Anadyne, Inc., in collaboration with UC Santa Cruz, has developed a prototype SiGe front-end readout chip optimized for low power and timing resolution. Two versions of the chip were produced with performance in simulation: a more power version with 10 ps resolution at 5 fC with 1.1 mW/channel, and a less power version with 10 ps resolution at 8 fC with 0.6 mW/channel.The chip was produced at Tower Semiconductor with 350 nm technology. The ASIC from the prototype run shows good performance: a rise time of 0.7–1 ns and 25 mV per fC response with RMS noise <1 mV. Simulation and results from the prototype will be reported in this paper.

Instruments & Instrumentation↗
DOE OSTI2024

Integration of the fundamental knowledge on solvent-packing interactions into the multiscale framework for column scale design and optimization

The interfacial area, also known as the effective mass transfer area, is a key factor for determining the mass transfer for carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) capture via the chemical absorption process in a packed column, and thus the overall capture efficiency of the packed column. Most of the widely used empirical and semi-empirical models for interfacial area were derived indirectly through absorption mass transfer with simplifications based on fast chemical kinetics. This report presents the comprehensive unique multiscale approach to develop a surrogate model for effective mass transfer area in structured packed columns that accounts local hydrodynamics as well as variation in physical properties, and changes in solid surface characteristics.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2022

Study of the Printability, Microstructures, and Mechanical Performances of Laser Powder Bed Fusion Built Haynes 230

The nickel-based superalloy, Haynes 230 (H230), is widely used in high-temperature applications, e.g., heat exchangers, because of its excellent high-temperature mechanical properties and corrosion resistance. As of today, H230 is not yet in common use for 3D printing, i.e., metal additive manufacturing (AM), primarily because of its hot cracking tendency under fast solidification. The ability to additively fabricate components in H230 attracts many applications that require the additional advantages leveraged by adopting AM, e.g., higher design complexity and faster prototyping. In this study, we fabricated nearly fully dense H230 in a laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) process through parameter optimization. The efforts revealed the optimal process space which could guide future fabrication of H230 in various metal powder bed fusion processes. The metallurgical analysis identified the cracking problem, which was resolved by increasing the pre-heat temperature from 80 °C to 200 °C. A finite element simulation suggested that the pre-heat temperature has limited impacts on the maximum stress experienced by each location during solidification. Additionally, the crack morphology and the microstructural features imply that solidification and liquation cracking are the more probable mechanisms. Both the room temperature tensile test and the creep tests under two conditions, (a) 760 °C and 100 MPa and (b) 816 °C and 121 MPa, confirmed that the AM H230 has properties comparable to its wrought counterpart. The fractography showed that the heat treatment (anneal at 1200 °C for 2 h, followed by water quench) balances the strength and the ductility, while the printing defects did not appreciably accelerate part failure.

14 SOLAR ENERGY↗
NASA NTRS1992

Analysis of a spatial tracking subsystem for optical communications

Spatial tracking plays a very critical role in designing optical communication systems because of the small angular beamwidth associated with the optical signal. One possible solution for spatial tracking is to use a nutating mirror which dithers the incoming beam at a rate much higher than the mechanical disturbances. A power detector then senses the change in detected power as the signal is reflected off the nutating mirror. This signal is then correlated with the nutator driver signals to obtain estimates of the azimuth and elevation tracking signals to control the fast scanning mirrors. A theoretical analysis is performed for a spatial tracking system using a nutator disturbed by shot noise and mechanical vibrations. Contributions of shot noise and mechanical vibrations to the total tracking error variance are derived. Given the vibration spectrum and the expected signal power, there exists an optimal amplitude for the nutation which optimizes the receiver performance. The expected performance of a nutator based system is estimated based on the choice of nutation amplitude.

Win, Moe Z.↗
NASA NTRS2012

Preliminary Benefits Assessment of Traffic Aware Strategic Aircrew Requests (TASAR)

While en route, aircrews submit trajectory change requests to air traffic control (ATC) to better meet their objectives including reduced delays, reduced fuel burn, and passenger comfort. Aircrew requests are currently made with limited to no information on surrounding traffic. Consequently, these requests are uninformed about a key ATC objective, ensuring traffic separation, and therefore less likely to be accepted than requests informed by surrounding traffic and that avoids creating conflicts. This paper studies the benefits of providing aircrews with on-board decision support to generate optimized trajectory requests that are probed and cleared of known separation violations prior to issuing the request to ATC. These informed requests are referred to as traffic aware strategic aircrew requests (TASAR) and leverage traffic surveillance information available through Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcast (ADS-B) In capability. Preliminary fast-time simulation results show increased benefits with longer stage lengths since beneficial trajectory changes can be applied over a longer distance. Also, larger benefits were experienced between large hub airports as compared to other airport sizes. On average, an aircraft equipped with TASAR reduced its travel time by about one to four minutes per operation and fuel burn by about 50 to 550 lbs per operation depending on the objective of the aircrew (time, fuel, or weighted combination of time and fuel), class of airspace user, and aircraft type. These preliminary results are based on analysis of approximately one week of traffic in July 2012 and additional analysis is planned on a larger data set to confirm these initial findings.

Henderson, Jeff↗
DOE OSTI2023

Efficient Fast Fractionation of Biomass Using a Diol-Based Deep Eutectic Solvent for Facilitating Enzymatic Hydrolysis and Obtaining High-Quality Lignin

Current DES pretreatment is often performed under relatively severe conditions with high temperature, long time, and high DES usage. This work studied a short-time diol DES (deep eutectic solvent) pretreatment under mild conditions to fractionate the bamboo, facilitate enzymatic hydrolysis, and obtain high-quality lignin. At an optimized condition of 130 °C for only 10 min, lignin and xylan removal reached 61.34% and 84.15 %, with residual glucan showing a ~90% enzymatic hydrolysis yield. Equally important, the dissolved lignin could be readily recovered with 97.51% yield, exhibiting 96.65 % β-O-4 preservation. The fractionation and lignin protection mechanisms were unveiled by XRD, FTIR, cellulose-DP, 2D HSQC NMR, 31 P NMR and GPC analysis. Finally, this study highlighted that short-time fractionation of bamboo can be achieved by a diol-based DES which is an ideal strategy to upgrade the lignocellulose biomass for high enzymatic hydrolysis yields and high-quality lignin stream.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2023

Adaptive sampling for accelerating neutron diffraction-based strain mapping *

Abstract Neutron diffraction is a useful technique for mapping residual strains in dense metal objects. The technique works by placing an object in the path of a neutron beam, measuring the diffracted signals and inferring the local lattice strain values from the measurement. In order to map the strains across the entire object, the object is stepped one position at a time in the path of the neutron beam, typically in raster order, and at each position a strain value is estimated. Typical dwell times at neutron diffraction instruments result in an overall measurement that can take several hours to map an object that is several tens of centimeters in each dimension at a resolution of a few millimeters, during which the end users do not have an estimate of the global strain features and are at risk of incomplete information in case of instruments outages. In this paper, we propose an object adaptive sampling strategy to measure the significant points first. We start with a small initial uniform set of measurement points across the object to be mapped, compute the strain in those positions and use a machine learning technique to predict the next position to measure in the object. Specifically, we use a Bayesian optimization based on a Gaussian process regression method to infer the underlying strain field from a sparse set of measurements and predict the next most informative positions to measure based on estimates of the mean and variance in the strain fields estimated from the previously measured points. We demonstrate our real-time measure-infer-predict workflow on additively manufactured steel parts—demonstrating that we can get an accurate strain estimate even with 30%–40% of the typical number of measurements—leading the path to faster strain mapping with useful real-time feedback. We emphasize that the proposed method is general and can be used for fast mapping of other material properties such as phase fractions from time-consuming point-wise neutron measurements.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2022

Development of lean, efficient, and fast physics-framed deep-learning-based proxy models for subsurface carbon storage

In this work, we present deep-learning-based surrogate models for CCUS developed with four different algorithms and a physics-framed two-phase flow problem involving displacement of water by CO 2 . The deep-learning models were trained using 3D datasets describing the pressure plume, CO 2 saturation plume, and water extraction rate generated by numerical simulation. The hyperparameters defining the architecture of the neural networks were optimized to determine the slimmest network size and training parameters that give the most efficient performance at the least training cost. To develop a robust model that closely mimics the governing physical laws, the discretized form of the two-phase fluid transport equation was used to formulate the supervised deep-learning task. The algorithms investigated in this study predicted the data to above 95% accuracy, with the multi-layer perceptron model demonstrating the best performance by balancing training speed, prediction time, and prediction accuracy with lean network capacity. Furthermore, the surrogate models simultaneously predict reservoir pressure and CO 2 saturation in every grid block, including the surface well extraction rate and bottomhole pressure, at all simulation times for a given static model realization in just a few seconds on a standard desktop computer. A key outcome of this study is that limits can be placed on network design parameters to avoid over designing neural networks, with associated efficiencies in training and prediction times. This is very useful because large volumes of data may be generated in CCUS projects and over-design of neural network architectures imposes penalties that are antithetical to the goal of near-real time forecasting.

58 GEOSCIENCES↗
DOE OSTI2024

Carbon‐13 Hyperpolarization of α‐Ketocarboxylates with Parahydrogen in Reversible Exchange

Abstract Signal Amplification by Reversible Exchange (SABRE) is a relatively simple and fast hyperpolarization technique that has been used to hyperpolarize the α‐ketocarboxylate pyruvate, a central metabolite and the leading hyperpolarized MRI contrast agent. In this work, we show that SABRE can readily be extended to hyperpolarize 13 C nuclei at natural abundance on many other α‐ketocarboxylates. Hyperpolarization is observed and optimized on pyruvate (P 13C =17 %) and 2‐oxobutyrate (P 13C =25 %) with alkyl chains in the R‐group, oxaloacetate (P 13C =11 %) and alpha‐ketoglutarate (P 13C =13 %) with carboxylate moieties in the R group, and phenylpyruvate (P 13C =2 %) and phenylglyoxylate (P 13C =2 %) with phenyl rings in the R‐group. New catalytically active SABRE binding motifs of the substrates to the hyperpolarization transfer catalyst – particularly for oxaloacetate – are observed. We experimentally explore the connection between temperature and exchange rates for all of these SABRE systems and develop a theoretical kinetic model, which is used to fit the hyperpolarization build‐up and decay during SABRE activity.

McBride, Stephen J. [Department of Chemistry North↗
DOE OSTI2023

Development of a compact fast-neutron spectrometer for nuclear emergency response applications

We have developed a Compact Fast Neutron Spectrometer (CFNS) for passive assay of special nuclear material (SNM) through the observation of fast neutrons. The CFNS consists of eight organic glass scintillators (OGS) coupled to silicon photomultipliers and a waveform digitizer, which are integrated within a human-portable box. The CFNS determines the neutron energy profile by spectrum unfolding using the Maximum-Likelihood Expectation Maximization method. The detector acquisition system was optimized to have a dynamic range of up to 10 MeV neutron energy. Bulk special nuclear material (SNM) measurements from the National Criticality Experiments Research Center were analyzed for SNM validation/examination. Additionally, the results show that the CFNS can be used to distinguish between fission and (α, n) neutron emitters, regardless of intervening material type (Cu and polyethylene) and thickness, by taking the ratio of neutron counts at different regions in the unfolded energy spectrum. Additionally, by fitting an exponential curve to the unfolded energy spectrum of PuO 2 and Pu neutron emitters, the CFNS showed the ability of distinguishing between pure Pu oxide, pure Pu metal and mixed oxide-metal configurations.

46 INSTRUMENTATION RELATED TO NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND ↗
DOE OSTI2026

Tunable Interfacial to Filamentary Resistive Switching Mechanism in Room-Temperature-Grown Amorphous YBa 2 Cu 3 O x with Excess Cu Addition

Resistive switching technologies have the potential not only to create large efficiency gains in computer memory but also to revolutionize emerging fields such as neuromorphic computing. In this paper, we report on novel resistive switching behavior in devices made from room-temperature-grown Cu-rich amorphous YBa 2 Cu 3 O x (YBCO) films, a material otherwise well-known as a high-temperature superconductor. In Nb:STO substrate/amorphous YBCO film (≈200 nm)/metallic Cu (15 nm)/metallic Pt (15 nm) devices, we demonstrate that the resistive switching can be tuned between mechanisms involving extended areas of the YBCO/electrode interface and a single-point filamentary mechanism simply by changing the Cu content of the deposition target and hence in the films. Changing the Cu content can also be used to optimize the properties of the devices further, with devices with an added 15 mol % of Cu in YBCO initially providing an on/off ratio >100, switching endurance potential >6500 cycles, and state retention >2 × 10 4 s, all at low switching fields of 0.3 MV/cm. The amalgam of promising resistive switching properties, fast growth (150 nm/min) at room temperature, and tuneability of the switching mechanism indicates the strong potential of this proof-of-concept amorphous system for future memory applications.

Cu↗
DOE OSTI2020

Sage: parallel semi-asymmtric graph algorithms for NVRAMs

Non-volatile main memory (NVRAM) technologies provide an attractive set of features for large-scale graph analytics, including byte-addressability, low idle power, and improved memory-density. NVRAM systems today have an order of magnitude more NVRAM than traditional memory (DRAM). NVRAM systems could therefore potentially allow very large graph problems to be solved on a single machine, at a modest cost. However, a significant challenge in achieving high performance is in accounting for the fact that NVRAM writes can be much more expensive than NVRAM reads. In this paper, we propose an approach to parallel graph analytics using the Parallel Semi-Asymmetric Model (PSAM), in which the graph is stored as a read-only data structure (in NVRAM), and the amount of mutable memory is kept proportional to the number of vertices. Similar to the popular semi-external and semi-streaming models for graph analytics, the PSAM approach assumes that the vertices of the graph fit in a fast read-write memory (DRAM), but the edges do not. In NVRAM systems, our approach eliminates writes to the NVRAM, among other benefits. To experimentally study this new setting, we develop Sage, a parallel semi-asymmetric graph engine with which we implement provably-efficient (and often work-optimal) PSAM algorithms for over a dozen fundamental graph problems. We experimentally study Sage using a 48--core machine on the largest publicly-available real-world graph (the Hyperlink Web graph with over 3.5 billion vertices and 128 billion edges) equipped with Optane DC Persistent Memory, and show that Sage outperforms the fastest prior systems designed for NVRAM. Importantly, we also show that Sage nearly matches the fastest prior systems running solely in DRAM, by effectively hiding the costs of repeatedly accessing NVRAM versus DRAM.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗
NASA NTRS2001

Civil Tiltrotor Feasibility Study for the New York and Washington Terminal Areas

NASA tasked LMI to assess the potential contributions of a yet-undeveloped Civil Tiltrotor aircraft (CTR) in improving capacity in the National Airspace System in all weather conditions. The CTRs studied have assumed operating parameters beyond current CTR capabilities. LMI analyzed CTRs three ways: in fast-time terminal area modeling simulations of New York and Washington to determine delay and throughput impacts; in the Integrated Noise Model, to determine local environmental impact; and with an economic model, to determine the price viability of a CTR. The fast-time models encompassed a 250 nmi range and included traffic interactions from local airports. Both the fast-time simulation and the noise model assessed impacts from traffic levels projected for 1999, 2007, and 2017. Results: CTRs can reduce terminal area delays due to concrete congestion in all time frames. The maximum effect, the ratio of CTRs to jets and turboprop aircraft at a subject airport should be optimized. The economic model considered US traffic only and forecasted CTR sales beginning in 2010.

Stouffer, Virginia↗